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Summary: Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has been criticised for now supporting the pre-departure detention of immigrant children in the UK, a practice which in 2010 he described as 'state-sponsored cruelty'.
[7 September 2011] - Nick Clegg was accused today of betraying his promise to end child detention after the coalition government announced plans for a new family detention unit in Sussex. End Child Detention Now demanded an urgent parliamentary debate to hold the Deputy PM to account for reneging on a pledge he made in May 2010. It condemned the opening at the new Cedars "pre-departure accommodation" at Pease Pottage. The Home Office says that the facility - to be run by G4S with the support of Barnardo's - will only be used as a last resort after advice has been sought from the Independent Family Returns Panel. The majority of families will stay there for less than 72 hours and only after having been offered "numerous options to return home voluntarily," it claims. "Families will stay together in one of nine fully equipped apartments. They will also have access to communal facilities and be able to leave the accommodation subject to risk assessment," a spokeswoman stated. But End Child Detention Now co-ordinator Dr Simon Parker condemned the government's continued detention of children. "We have seen the damage that even short periods of detention can have on the lives of the thousands of children that were detained by the previous Labour government. "The opening of Pease Pottage represents a major step backwards in the campaign to end what Nick Clegg himself described as the 'state-sponsored cruelty' of detaining children," he said. "Sadly it would seem that innocent children will once again be locked up to appease tabloid headline writers and to service the profits of Britain's lucrative detention industry." Opening the facility last week Immigration Minister Damian Green said: "The opening of the new pre-departure accommodation represents the final stage in the government's new approach to returning families found to have no right to be in the UK. "We will continue to remove people with no right to be in the UK if they do not take the opportunity to return voluntarily. "This facility will allow us to do so in a way that provides more support to children and their families." Further Information:
Owner: Paddy McGuffinpdf: http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/109215